The present invention relates generally to heating units.
More particularly, this invention relates to heating units mounted on a window of an existing building. Often owners of buildings such as homes and small businesses desire a method of heating a limited area within the structure. This may permit a building owner to heat only certain areas in the building thereby providing significant cost savings. In addition, the building owner may simply want to provide extra heating to a particular location in the building without having to heat the remainder of the building to the desired temperature.
Heating units burning pelletized fuel provide an efficient and cheap method of heating certain locations of the home or building. A heating unit with the ability to mount on the window, while safely expelling the resulting flue gas outside the building, provides the owner with the ability to heat any location with window access.
Prior art window heating units have several disadvantages. A first prior art heating unit requires a specialized chimney in order to expel flue gases. The device has back walls which extend into a mobile home. Upon mounting on the window, doors for entering fuel into the firebox are located outside the mobile home. Furthermore, a passage in communication with the outside of the mobile home provides access to outside air for combustion. This outside air enters through the bottom of the firebox, burns the pelletized fuel and is elevated through a chimney inside the mobile home. This device clearly has several limitations. First, the location of the device is limited by the location of the chimney in the mobile home. Second, the doors for inserting the fuel are located outside the mobile home, requiring an owner to go outside in order to provide additional fuel for the heating unit. Finally, the device only heats the back walls of the firebox. The device thus does not provide a method of blowing warm air into the building.
In a second prior art embodiment, the heating unit is mounted on a window with a pair of rail members, one on the top and one on the bottom of the window. The rail members embodying the guide tracks are respectively adapted to seat the lower edge of the window and the upper edge of the window sill upon which the heating unit is mounted. Surrounding the heating unit is a generally rectangular U-shaped frame. This U-shaped frame inserts into the guide tracks thereby mounting the heating unit within the building. However, such a configuration is prone to damage the window. The entire weight of the heating unit is supported in the window sill through a thin rail. Consequently, a tremendous amount of pressure is placed on the window sill.